Page 22 - Foundations of Naturopathic Medicine

Naturopathic Medicine
HISTORY AND PROFESSIONAL FORMATION TIMELINE
A Living Chronicle: A Tapestry of People, Events and Institutions
were asked to identify information they thought was important to include in this endeavor, and the team received a wealth of information from around the world about the people, events, institutions, organizations, and publications that have helped shape the profession of naturopathic medicine. This input was collated, analyzed, and added to the emerging Timeline Version 2.0 based on verification and timeline criteria.
Phase Three: Timeline Version 2.0: Agency Liaison (2) Review, Expansion, Query Action Tables
Within the development of Version 2.0 (2011), the initial focus was expanded to include more information about earlier history and international developments, and to more fully represent the active profession around the world. The Timeline team added Global Health Participation and Practice Models and Delivery to the Benchmarks, taking the number from nine to eleven; experts in Canada, Australia, the UK, and Natural Doctors International were consulted for the additional Global Health Participation entry material. Senior Editors, Associate Editors, select individuals, and subject experts also assisted with data and
review, and the main team interviewed most of the AANP’s previous and current Presidents and Executive Directors. Approximately sixty-five Agency Liaisons including board members and executive staff from the profession’s major organizations, were invited to review the timeline and to complete an Audience Analysis (a survey on timeline features and usability). Thirty-eight also provided full reviews to the History team.
The FNM History and Timeline team further refined and defined criteria for entries, and assembled all of the entries from phase one and two into a continuously evolving Query Action Table (QAT) in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. The refined criteria were applied to each query once the data was verified to determine inclusion. Authors, editors, fellows and students continued robust research outside the QAT process and entered verified data into the timeline.
Phase Four Timeline 3.0: Query Action, Research, and Final Review
The Timeline team, including physicians, educators, editors, fellows, facilitators, production managers, and students, further developed the QAT spreadsheet to organize a systematic process for documenting the collaborative process of introducing, researching, verifying, editing, and approving proposed, incomplete, complex, and/or nuanced entries. Each entry requiring further investigation was categorized by the entry year, the party responsible for resolution, query exploration notes, and query resolution notes. Information gathered from the investigative process was documented under query exploration notes and any steps taken toward resolution were updated accordingly, including assignments such as tracking sources, crafting language, assigning benchmarks, sources of input, and final approval of entries for inclusion.
Queries covered a broad range of topics: date verification of important events in the timeline (e.g., school incorporation, closings, and transitions; publications; legislation; leadership terms); substantiation of facts regarding the history of the profession (e.g., 1900s-1930s: more than 20 naturopathic medical schools reported in the United States; 1971: resurgence of student interest in naturopathic medicine as NCNM sees steady increase in student admissions); and crafting and finalizing timeline entries. Queries proposed as resolved by the responsible party were verified by the FNM History Section Editor and marked as resolved. Timeline entries were then created based on the verified information, benchmarks were assigned, and language finalized for timeline inclusion. The Foundations Production Editor regularly clarified and updated the QAT to ensure efficiency and maintain a consistent methodology across multiple contributing team members over a decade.
As collecting timeline entries is an open-ended and ongoing, organic process, timing for submission for final review before republication was based on several factors: significant progress in collecting new entries,
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